


Aaron Burr's Special Hell

by 1780AWintersBall



Series: One Chapter, One Story [2]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Don't Judge Me, F/M, M/M, Not intentional!, Thanks mates, Yes 'Deadly Nothingness' 'Breeze' and 'Blood' are characters, hope you guys like it, super fluff ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-02
Updated: 2017-11-02
Packaged: 2019-01-28 07:03:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12600972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1780AWintersBall/pseuds/1780AWintersBall
Summary: Aaron Burr, after outliving Alexander Hamilton by 32 years, finally died. He expected to waltz right up to the gates of Heaven, having thought that his duel with the man that had haunted his dreams (and sometimes his waking hours) for years afterward would be put behind him, but he was proven sorely wrong. Enter all the things Burr feared and fears as he runs through his special hell, time and time again meeting the screwed up and demonized Hamilton of Burr's nightmares.





	Aaron Burr's Special Hell

Burr walked up the stairs to the enormous pearly white gates that signified Heaven.

  “Ahhh,” he sighed, as a warm breeze ruffled his wide overcoat, the beautiful white clouds shifting around calmly.

  He reached the gates, and was just about to push them open when he heard a very, very familiar voice.

  “Well, if it isn’t Aaron Burr, sir.”

  Burr whipped around, his body swaying a little bit, his eyes wide.

  Behind him, Alexander Hamilton stood, a small, defeated smile on his lips, his eyes neutral. He was wearing The sky around him seemed darker than what Burr had just been walking through, and he had a slight aura of malice around him.

   “I didn’t think that you would make it,” said Hamilton, his small smile widening into a more sinister grin.

  “Er, to be sure, sir!” said Burr, feeling worried. Burr killed Hamilton. Everyone knew that. Was Hamilton going to forgive him?

  “We’ve had quite a run, wouldn’t you say?” Hamilton said, his eyes slightly glittering.

  Burr tried on a smile. “Yeah, we have, old friend! Have you made it in the gates yet-”

  Burr made to gesture to where the Heavenly gates should have been, but they were gone. Nothing replaced them, just a stretch of white clouds growing darker by the minute. He turned to make sure his peripheral wasn’t fooling him, throwing away his facade smile for a frown.

  Hamilton held Burr’s shoulder. His hand felt cold, dead, as if it had been sitting in ice water for the last few years. “Oh, don’t go yet, won’t you stay for the welcoming party? You know, you’ve gotten quite a stir down here.”

  “Welcoming party?” Burr’s frown deepened with anxiety. “Down here? I’m sorry, sir, I’m not sure I follow.”

  “Ah, but I think you do, Burr,” Hamilton’s voice was beginning to become warped, mutilated, wrong, and Burr was scared to turn towards him.

  The clouds had become almost pitch black to the point where Burr was unsure if his eyes were open, with thunder and pale lightning cracking through at various points. Little mounds of something had started to come through the clouds, like the tops of mountains.

  “And really, I don’t think Theodosia wants to see you right now.”

  Burr finally built up the courage and turned back around. Hamilton had disappeared. What was now on his shoulder was a dead rat, cold blood running from somewhere on it’s body. Burr screamed and shoved the rat off his shoulder, a red stain now sitting on his overcoat.

  The rat fell, but made no noise when it hit the floor. _Floor_.

  Burr looked around. A hallway had built around him as he was distracted with the small deceased mammal. The hall was dark, reddish-purple in tinge, and utterly barren. No doors, no pictures on the walls, no windows. Burr checked behind him once more. There was a wall there, and no way to go back.

  Burr turned back to the hall. There was a pin-prick of light at the end. Burr squinted. What was that?

  “You wanted to be in the room where it happened, didn’t you?” Hamilton’s warped voice whispered in his ear. Burr jumped ten feet, swinging his arm around. He looked to where the wall had been behind him.

  The wall seemed to have gone, replaced by more hall, and there was darkness closing in behind him. Burr’s eyes widened. That was bad.

  “Go!” Hamilton’s voice kept fluctuating, going high, then low **;** as if coming from a gramophone, then as if he were right there. “Run! Run for all you’re worth, murderer!”

  The last word was accompanied by other voices. Was that John Laurens? Thomas Jefferson? And maybe Hercules Mulligan? Burr didn’t have time to think, the darkness carried sounds, clunky, heavy footfalls, whispers, a low, fluctuating, humming, and those sounds were coming closer. He took what Hamilton had said in stride and started to run towards the light.

  It was so far off… Why did it have to be so far away, so small? While running, he glanced back at the darkness. There was a figure in it, running after him. It looked familiar, and it was duplicating, more figures were there. They all looked like people he knew, though none were friends.

  Burr turned back to the light, his face stricken with horror. It was getting bigger now, as he ran forward. It changed into a door shape, the door itself swinging slightly.

  The whispering in the darkness got louder, turning into loud talking, and Burr could hear some of what it was saying.

  “What do you stall for?”

  He was close, the door was so close, but still so far.

  “Burr, the revolution’s imminent!”

  The light from the door started to finally reach his feet, illuminating his boots.

  “Burr, close the door on your way out.”

  The light lit up the blood stain on his shoulder.

  “See you on the other side of the war.”

  Their voices sounded wrong, imitated, and they started reaching a fever pitch, screaming out and making the ringing in his ears louder and louder. The humming was getting louder too, like a storm of non-stop thunder.

  “Burr, when you see Hamilton, thank him for the endorsement.”

  He was so close, he could almost see what was through the door. What had Hamilton said? This was the room where it happened? “No one else was in the room where it happened…” Burr whispered to himself.

  “That’s right, Burr,” whispered Hamilton’s mutilated voice in his ear, “no one but me, Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Madison…”

  “Maybe we could solve one problem with another!”

  He stretched out his arm as he felt the all-encompassing cold touch of the darkness on his back.

  “You get nothing if you wait for it, wait for it, wait!”

  So close, so close!

  “Burr, check what we got!”

  “I will not equivocate on my opinion!”

  “Burr, you disgust me.”

  He reached the door, the darkness pulling on his back. He grabbed the handle, sidestepped inside, and yanked it shut on the horrid arms of the shadow figures. From the other side of the door, Burr heard screams and something splat on the ground, then silence.

  Burr sighed, taking his hand away from the door handle, and turned around, only to take in a deep intake of  sharp breath.

  Music had started to play, a ballroom medley that looped, though no source of music could be seen. Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton had started a dance, with James Madison off to the side, coughing, seemingly keeping watch over whatever papers were in front of him. His hands were clasped, and he spotted Burr. Madison was never one to be very angry, but in that moment that Burr and Madison made eye contact, the whole room seemed to dissipate, the music seemed to dull. Madison’s eyes seemed to be a window to the very pits of hell, they were so angry and full of hatred.

  “We told you not to come in, Mr. Burr,” said Madison, his voice cold and, like Hamilton’s, warped and wrong.

  “Well, I…” everything seemed to come back to life as Burr got distracted by Hamilton and Jefferson’s dance.

  Jefferson had just dipped Hamilton low, and was now bringing him back up. The two spun for one spin, then Jefferson whipped Hamilton out of his arms. Hamilton wheeled across the floor in a tight pirouette, and came spinning back into Jefferson’s arms, who caught him. The two started a short four-step. The four-step led to a slight downwards drop, in which Jefferson moved his hand from Hamilton’s arm to the small of his back. Then, with minimal effort, Jefferson picked up and flung Hamilton into the air. Hamilton practically hovered in the air, spinning, then snapped his body into a starfish position, and landed in Jefferson’s awaiting arms. Jefferson caught Hamilton easily, and dropped him into a low, close dip, in which Hamilton took the initiative and French kissed Jefferson, deep.

  Burr’s eyes went wide. What in the name of God was happening?! Hamilton and Jefferson would never do this if they had any ounce of free will. Although, Burr had always wondered how Hamilton had convinced Jefferson and Madison to agree to his financial plan…

  Burr seemed to have spaced off, because now the other three men were staring at Burr. Hamilton and Jefferson were now lying on the floor.

  “I, um…” he didn’t know what to say.

  Hamilton disengaged from Jefferson. “You’ll never know what got discussed, Burr. We’ve already done that. Now, if you’d be so kind as to leave.”

  God, Hamilton’s voice disturbed him. It was so wildly NOT him, and yet…

  “I… no. I’m not leaving,” said Burr, a hint of defiance in his voice.

  Jefferson cocked an eyebrow at Burr. “Really? Not leaving? Well,” he said with a muted laugh, his voice also wrong, “we’ll just have to force you out. Madison!”

  Madison got up from his chair with a sneeze as Jefferson looked Hamilton up and down, Hamilton’s eyes firing up.

  “Tell me,” Jefferson said, as he and Hamilton laid on the floor and stared into each other’s eyes, his voice low, a seductive smile on his lips, “what does it look like outside, Madison?”

  The physically impaired Virginian walked to the window. The _window_. When had that been there? Burr followed Madison with his eyes, then stared at the curtained window as Madison opened the blinds.

  It seemed to be midnight outside, but that was not the worst of it. There was a splatter of blood on the window that seemed to be moving to a rhythm, as if it were still in tune with the heart. Burr gagged at the sight of the splatter, and looked back down at Hamilton and Jefferson.

  Hamilton had begun to cry, though his facial expression was far from in pain. His tears hit the floor as Jefferson smothered his forehead in kisses. There seemed to be an enormous amount of blood on the floor around them, and soon Burr knew why.

  Hamilton’s gunshot wound. That hadn’t been there before. Hamilton bled out, but no one but Burr seemed to notice. Jefferson’s and Hamilton’s clothes were soon thoroughly drenched in blood, as they moved in a sideways, shuffling second dance enwrapped in each other.

  Madison turned towards Burr, stepping over Hamilton and Jefferson. “You shouldn’t have come. It’s midnight, you don’t want to see what happens at midnight. It’s called the ‘Room Where It Happens’ for a reason.”

  Madison’s voice seemed to be stuck on deep, with gramophone static. The invisible orchestra had reached a peak with the ground-sprawled dancers, seeming to have gone with the more frantic, high-pitched songs now.

  Burr backed up, hoping to find the door knob. He couldn’t feel it, just wall. Where was the door knob? He turned to where the door should have been, but it was gone. He looked back. The room was starting to dim, the men’s faces becoming more shadowed, more sinister-looking. Hamilton’s tears were getting more intense, and the floor around him and Jefferson was becoming one big mat of blood. The room stank of that horrible metallic smell.

  Madison crossed the room and grabbed Burr’s arm. He pulled Burr to where the window was, stepping over the writhing figures on the floor. “You’ll have to jump, but for a man of no morals, you should be able to go with the wind, isn’t that right, Burr?”

  Madison’s voice was accompanied by a few other voices, as if he were harbouring more than just himself in his body. It sounded like George Washington, Marquis de Lafayette, maybe Charles Lee, but Burr wasn’t sure.

  Burr struggled against Madison, but the latter was bigger and stronger. Burr was no match for Madison. Wasn’t Madison supposed to be sick? Shouldn’t that weaken him? Apparently not, for then he grabbed Burr’s back and legs, pulling him up into a tight, painful cradle. Burr again struggled, but in vain, and soon Madison was rocking Burr, ready to throw him out the window.

  Just as Madison rocked back for the final time, the orchestra dropped away to a single trumpet on an ear-splitting quintuple high C. Madison finally rocketed Burr out the bloodied window with a crash, glass following him out as he flailed, as the trumpeted note finally dropped away and the rest of the orchestra joined in.

  Burr had expected ground to meet him, to see other buildings outside the room, but there was nothing, just a black void. The room itself sat on a thin pillar of dirt that seemed to be attached to oblivion below, and he couldn’t see the hall he had run through.

  Through the window, Hamilton’s and Jefferson’s mutated voices called, “If you stand for nothing, Burr, what’ll you fall for?”

  Burr fell. He fell and fell and fell, darkness all around, nothing there but him. It was an endless, empty void, a chasm with no sides.

  Burr heard things, voices, from people, friends and enemies. “Well, if it ain’t the prodigy of Princeton College!”

  “Raise a glass to freedom!”

  “I’ve been reading Common Sense by Thomas Paine, some men say that I’m intense or I’m insane!”

  He could imagine life as he knew it normally, how he’d gone on after Hamilton had died, how so many had mistrusted him after the duel.

  “Burr, I’d rather be divisive, than indecisive!”

  “Who’re you? … As you were.”

  “Is it a matter of if, Burr, or which one?”

  How he’d married, time and time again, but to no true avail. His first love passed on, his second left just as he died. How demanding love was!

  “I didn’t think that you would make it!”

  “Lee, do you yield?”

  “You shot him in the side,” whispered Burr into the emptiness, “yes he yields…”

  “If I can prove that I never broke the law, do you promise not to tell another soul what you saw?”

  “I am not the reason no one trusts you, no one knows what you believe!”

  Burr tried to push away these voices, tried to get away from his thoughts, tried to get out of wherever he was, but he couldn’t get out. He was stuck. The voices faded, and he was left alone. He was falling. It was so quiet in the darkness, no beat, no melody. It felt easier to just swim down…

  “I’m sorry, Alexander!” he cried out into the darkness, his voice lost to the emptiness, “I didn’t… you shot, and I reacted, I… I didn’t intend for you to die, I’m sorry!”

  For a moment, nothing happened. Burr kept falling. In that time, Burr had a panic attack. What if this is what eternity was going to be? What if this was his punishment? He felt a horrible, strangled feeling in his throat, he realized he couldn’t breath, he couldn’t hear his heart, everything was going wrong-

  Then, something touched his back, light and comforting. It swirled from his back to around his sides, a warm, happy breeze. The breeze seemed to push him up, slowing him in his fall, and with the breeze, the darkness seemed to give way ever so slightly to deep, deep grays, mahoganies, magentas, and oranges.

  Burr soon felt like he was hovering **;** not falling, but not flying, in an odd starfish position on his back. The breeze wrapped around Burr, fluctuating between warm and slightly cold.

  “Wh-what now?” called Burr at the dim, dark colours.

  The colours were starting to become more vibrant, mahogany red, violet, deep yellows, slashes of deep forest greens. The black and grays were starting to become less and less apparent.

  “Aaron?” A faint voice called. It sounded feminine, soft, and lovely.

  “Aaron, is that you?” The voice grew bigger, more obvious. It wasn’t warped or wrong, it was a beautiful melody, a song through the silence.

  “Who’s calling for me?” cried Burr, his voice cracking with strain and panic.

  “Darling, is it truly thou who appears above me?” Burr recognized the voice. She was a friend. A close companion. A lover…

  “Th-Theo? Theodosia?” Burr called out into the oblivion. The breeze gave way a bit and Burr floated down. There was whites around him, popping reds, light lavender purples, lightning yellows, grass greens.

  There was a floor, shifting and changing with the explosive colours. Burr hit the floor hard, his back thudding upon it, but he quickly got up.

  He looked around for Theodosia, looked around for where her voice had come from. “Where are you, my love? I can’t see you!”

  His voice echoed. There shouldn’t have been an echo, but somehow the sound ricocheted off of something. Off of what?

  “Theodosia?” Burr called again. Nothing responded, just his own voice, the colours moving and distracting him.

   Burr took a step forward. Where was he? What was going on? “Hello?” he tried once more.

  Then, he listened. He stood still, letting the warm, calming wind around him go past. It made no sound, but there was something else coming from somewhere.

  The colours were starting to die down and resort to black again, but as they did, one single note gently pierced the sound of silence.

  It sounded like a violin, it’s note unbreaking, as if the bow was as long as a city street. The note, Burr figured, must have been a low D. It grew and grew, and soon Burr could tell which direction it was coming from.

  He turned towards the note. Theodosia must be over there! Soon, the only variant from black was sparks and pops of colour, little bursts in time with the odd 16th notes of other instruments, sometimes a trumpet, sometimes an alto saxophone, sometimes something else.

  Burr started to walk towards the note, towards the instruments. Where was this orchestra? Where was this band that had followed him through the window? Soon, he was jogging, wanting to get there faster.

  He started to run, and quite quickly he was full out sprinting, clinging to the fact that Theodosia was waiting for him. She was there. She had to be there!

  Burr closed his eyes, letting the musical whole note and bursts guide him through the empty space. He reached out his arms, to feel if there were any walls. The note got louder, the accompanying bursts getting sharper and more frequent. The colours popped through his eyelids, and soon there was so much noise and colours. So much movement, until…

  Burr ran face-first into something, his body knocking whatever it was with his force. Whatever it was hit the floor, and rustled what sounded like clothing.

  The note had stopped, and only maybe three instruments were still punctuating their playing through the void. Had he run into the violinist? He opened his eyes and looked down.

  Hamilton looked startled as he clambered back onto his feet again.

  Burr backed away a bit, making a point to put his hand under his jacket to where an empty pocket was. He didn’t want to take any chances.

  “Er…” Hamilton seemed to recognize Burr, and a honest smile crept over his features. “Well, if it isn’t Aaron Burr, sir!” his voice sounded normal enough, not mutilated or far off.

  Burr took another step back, making sure there was at least two meatures between himself and Hamilton. “Hello, Alexander Hamilton…”

  Hamilton grinned. “You know, you don’t have to use my whole name, you’ve got a lot less lengthy a name than I, my friend!”

  My _friend_. The last word was accompanied by others. It sounded like maybe John Laurens, Samuel Seabury, Elizabeth Hamilton, but Burr wasn’t sure.

  “Uh, yeah. I guess. Wait, friend?” Burr looked confused, and Hamilton frowned slightly.

  “Yeah, friend. Are you okay?”

  “I guess I’m just… are we alone?” asked Burr.

  Hamilton’s smile came back redoubled. “Of course not! Though…” Hamilton thought for a second, his hand on his chin. Then he gestured around himself. “You can see them, right? John, who’s right here, right?”

  Burr looked to where Hamilton was holding his hand, then shook his head. There was nothing there but empty space. What was Hamilton talking about?

  Hamilton frowned again. “What does it look like around you?” his voice had started to change again. It wasn’t odd and malicious, it started sounding more far-off, as if he were talking through a fog horn from a 10 mile distance.

  “It, uh…” Burr looked around again. How was he to describe the dark expanse he was in? “I stand now in a big black emptiness, with notes from instruments lighting up little bursts of colour. Is that not what you see, good sir?”

  Burr turned back to Hamilton, but Hamilton didn’t respond. His eyes looked vacant, his skin had gone gray, and there was a slight drip of bright crimson on his bottom lip. He stood there, not moving. Burr realized that there was something building behind him before it lashed out at Burr.

  Burr yelped and cried out as the something grabbed Burr by the neck, a tentacle of squishy nothingness, suffocating and horrid.

  It smelled like rotten pumpkins, and it was whispering something intense. It had no face, nor any definitive body, and the smell was affecting his taste, making him taste mould and mildew. It wrung Burr’s neck like he was a stuffed animal then threw him far away.

  Burr landed with a loud _CRACK_ , having broken his shin in the landing. Burr let out a gasp of pain.

  The horrid nothingness came after him again. Hamilton was nowhere to be seen.

  Burr lept to his feet, but his shin giving way beneath him. He staggered upright again, then started to limp away. The breeze that had followed him was replaced by a cold, wet mist that filled Burr’s lungs. It made him feel heavy, slimy, uncomfortable.

  The nothingness wrapped one of its formless arms around Burr’s unbroken leg and yanked it out from under him. He fell on his face with a loud thud, his nose spilling blood.

  As the arm pulled him into the air, Burr heard something clang to the ground below his head. A pistol, shiny and new, had fallen from who-knew-where, and just within Burr’s reach.

  With panicky haste, Burr stuck his arm down and grabbed the pistol. The freezing touch of the nothing nubbed his good leg, and frost crystals started to form upon it. It raised Burr high into the dark space, then, like a basketball player trying to get a good bounce, threw Burr down, hard.

  He landed on his arm, and it collapsed inward on itself with a loud, deafening _CRACK_!

  Burr screamed out, though not much sound actually came out. He leveled the pistol at the empty space the nothingness took up and was just about to fire when…

  “Burr? Burr, what are you doing? Burr!” Hamilton’s voice, high and panicky, cut through the nothing like a knife through butter.

  Everything went silent, even the pops of notes in the background. Hamilton stood, his hands in front of him, his green overcoat glistening with the horrible moisture in the air, and no pistol of his own, taking the place where the nothing had been.

  Burr, without being able to stop himself, shot his gun.

  The sound rang out, one enormous explosion of light and thunder, deafening and sudden. Hamilton’s glass-shattering scream could only just be made out over the gunshot, and he fell, a crumpled mess of clothes on the floor. The blood seemed to paint everything in sight, and Hamilton’s clothes turned from green to crimson fast.

  There was a cry, a gasp, and sudden rush of fabric rustling by. Burr lay on the ground, his eyes wide, his mouth slightly open, his pistol now on the ground.

  The new figure was in a long, blue dress, her long black hair sweeping over her face. She knelt beside Hamilton, her cries echoing around the chamber. _Chamber_. They were now in a hospital ward, the tiled floor cool on Burr’s arm.

  His arm and shin weren’t broken anymore. That was odd, why not? Maybe a doctor had fixed him up?

  Burr refocused his attention on the woman.

  “Eliza, I’m-” Burr started, his voice cracking, as he stumbled to get up.

  “I don’t care what you have to say, you miserable whelp!” she screamed at him. “Nothing you say will bring my husband from the dead! You could have been civil, but no, you played with his honour! You evil man, you stole him away from me, you murderer, you should be hanged!”

  Elizabeth Hamilton continued to cradle her dead husband's form in her hands. She cried and cried, the tears seemingly endless. The word ‘murderer’ was accompanied by a few other voices, Peggy Schuyler, maybe? And Philip Hamilton?

  Another woman’s voice came from behind Burr. “You godless being, you didn’t have to kill him. He raised his pistol at the sky, you should have followed suit.”

  Burr turned to see Angelica Schuyler standing behind him, her eyes flaming with rage, though she kept a straight face.

  “Angelica, I didn’t mean to, I-”

  “It doesn’t matter if you meant to or not now, does it, Mr. Burr? After the fact, of course you're sorry, but while you killed that man, while you were in the act, you didn’t care, did you? I bet you thought it was him or you, right? Yeah, well, it’s not always that black and white, Mr. Burr.”

  She spat out his name as if it were something disgusting. She then pushed passed him to comfort Eliza. Burr stood, feeling empty and defeated.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry, Hamilton, I’m sorry, Eliza, I’m sorry all those whom I’ve wronged!”

  “You’d better be,” Jefferson’s voice came from far away, again behind Burr.

  Burr whipped around, the scene changing once more. Jefferson stood at the end of another hallway, his arms crossed.

  This hallway was deep sea blue, with lamps lining the top near the roof. Burr was standing in a crossroads, a fourway. Three of them had something in them. Jefferson tapped his foot in the one directly in front of Burr. Madison stood still and angry in the one off to Burr’s right. The left was full of blood, with no door.

  Burr was afraid to turn around, to see what was in the fourth hall. He stared straight ahead at Jefferson, his face twisted with sadness and fear.

  “I’ve come to the conclusion,” said Jefferson, his voice menacing, “that you’re not to be trusted. I have here a document of signatures. Everyone agrees. You shouldn’t be in control of so much power. But I mean, why wouldn’t they agree with their _caring_ and _loving_ president?”

  Jefferson sneered the last sentence, his voice transitioning to warped and wrong.

  Then, with a few coughs and a sneeze from Madison, Jefferson and Madison started to come at Burr, walking in a menacing gate.

  Burr took in a heavy breath, his eyes somehow even wider. This was bad. Very, very bad. The hall with blood seemed to squeeze more blood out of it’s walls, and soon there was a wave of crimson that rushed at Burr.

  As Burr let his breath out again, the warm breeze that had followed him down his fall through darkness swept up dust on it’s way to Burr from his front. It hit him, a torrent of warmth, picking him up in it’s embrace. He was pushed down the hall behind him by the growing wind, as it whistled in his ears, the pressure increasingly getting more and more intense.

  The door at the end slammed open as the force of the wind pushed him through the frame. Jefferson and Madison were running at Burr as the ocean of blood spilled out from the left corridor.

  Like how it had opened, the door snapped shut just as Jefferson reached it, his hand outstretched, holding the signed document out.

  He screamed an inhuman scream as the door took off his arm. Burr landed with a thud on the other side, the magenta-wrapped arm falling to the ground. Total darkness surrounded him. He couldn’t see his own hand in front of his face.

  A slight light started to come from somewhere, and Burr could see figures, soft silhouettes, outlined by the tiny amount of light.

  He looked around and saw 18 figures in a circle around him. They were softly whispering something, though not the same things. Burr couldn’t quite hear what they were saying.

  “Uh, h-hello?” Burr asked, nervously as sweat accumulated around his neck.

  The whispering got louder, but still unintelligible. Burr covered his ears with his hands, the sound growing and shaking the ground.

  “I’m sorry!” he called out into the noise, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry! I shot out of reflex! I was wanting to become more honest! I didn’t want to fight any more! I’m sorry everyone, please, forgive me, let this end!”

  By the end of his speech, Burr was on his knees, his head down, his hands still over his ears. The circle of people had become silenced entirely, and were watching Burr.

  Finally, one came forward. Hamilton held out his hand. “It’s okay,” he said softly, his voice cracking with tears, the gunshot wound just barely visible in the low light.

  Burr took Hamilton’s hand, wiping his eyes, and standing up.

  “Thank you,” he whispered. “Thank you, thank you…”

  His voice trailed off as the surroundings changed once more. He was going up, the wind bracing his body, until he stood at the pearly white gates of Heaven once more.

  Burr hesitated. Were these the real gates? Would there be some form of Demon Hamilton ready to snatch his eternity away again? He stood staring at the heavenly gates, his mind wandering to the worst scenarios.

  He was snapped out of his thoughts as someone called to him. “Well, if it isn’t Aaron Burr, sir! I didn’t think that you would make it! But, what took you so long? Did you get lost on the way up?”

  Burr jumped back ten feet away from the gates, where the voice had come from. Hamilton was sticking his head through the gate bars, his normal attire bleached white, his wings sticking out on either side.

  “Hey, whoa, it’s okay, Burr!” said Hamilton, looking a little hurt, his wings drooping slightly. “You acted like I was going to hurt you, something wrong?”

  “I, uh…” Burr said, looking around the cloudy skyscape, watching for any abnormalities. There seemed to be none, so Burr continued. “I met you just a second ago, don’t you remember?”

  Hamilton shook his head as best he could between the bars. “No… no I don’t. Erm, well, why don’t you come in, though? I know you’ll like it, everyone does! And…” Hamilton paused for dramatic effect, “Theodosia is here! She’s been waiting for quite a while, now! Taking your advice, I suppose!”

  Burr’s thoughts of disaster demolished as Hamilton mentioned Theodosia. “She’s here? Theo’s really here?”

  Hamilton nodded, a huge, goofy grin on his face. “Yeah, old friend, come on in and you’ll see! Also, no one else wants me to tell you this, but…” Hamilton looked around himself for a quick second, then again continued, his face going serious, “we were rooting for you.”

  Burr looked Hamilton in the eyes. “Wh-what?”

  “We were rooting for you. We were hoping for you to get a better lot in life. Yeah, though that didn’t really come through, though, huh?”

  Burr chuckled, relaxing a bit. “No, not really.”

  Hamilton smiled again, a ray of sunshine in and of itself. He pushed open the gates to Heaven, and as Burr reluctantly went forward, the colours of his clothes chipped off, blowing away with the warm breeze that had come with him like leaves in an autumn wind.

  The mahogany that he’d been wearing, the blacks and greys and brown of his boots came off, and by the time Burr reached the gates, he was wearing a bleached white version of what he was just wearing.

  He breathed in a sigh, as though all his worries and fears had left him like the colours of his clothes had, and unfurled his wings.

  The white of the skyscape was almost blinding, and when Burr finally took one last step, hopping slightly over the white threshold, Hamilton wrapped Burr into a tight hug.

  “I never got to do this when we were alive, and I really need to do this now. I wish to make amends with you, Mr. Burr,” whispered Hamilton into his ear.

  Burr gave a small, tired smile, and hugged the man back. “Yeah, let’s make amends. And just Aaron would be fine.”

  Hamilton chuckled, then released Burr. “And now, welcome to the rest of your eternity! Have fun, Aaron! And, really, really try not to make enemies, okay?”

  “Okay. Same for you, Mr. Hothead,” replied Burr.

  “Hey now, watch it!” cried Hamilton with a laugh, unfurling his wings, “I’ve had a lot of practice with these, and I could probably dive bomb you into oblivion!”

  “Try me!” said Burr, who stretched his own pair to their limit.

  The pair took flight, and as the sun shone across the heavenly scape, one single white feather fell, all the way back to Earth, to rest upon the body of the man from which it had fallen.

 

_Fin._

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all for reading this work, I've had it in my Drive for a good while now, thought I should get it out there! Can you tell I'm a band person who plays trumpet, yet? 'Cause man, I mentioned it TWO WHOLE TIMES! Hah, so that's a thing. Anyways, hope to keep writing, and stay happy, you guys, gals, and -HAH COPYRIGHT! (probably)- pals!


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